Start Loving the Earth. Now!

Celebrating Earth Day isn’t mandatory. But paying to promote it is. Some local governmental agencies, in their local governmental way, are using our money to tell us we need to respect Mother Gaia, as they’re doing everything they can to ensure that the 2010 Buffalo-Niagara Earth Day Celebration is a blast. You may choose to get loaded during the soiree just to forget it happened.

And it gets worse once you’re home and log onto the internet with your world wide web device in order to obey the announcement’s command and “Take the Earth Day pledge.” The useless placards feature a worthless link to a pointless site with the usual self-righteous blather about refusing to drive alone under any circumstance:

Western New Yorkers are once again carpooling, biking, walking, and taking Metro Bus and Rail on Earth Day, 4/22. Register your organization and pledge your individual participation today!

Or, we could go nowhere: buses wouldn’t have to fuel up, and remaining stationary means we won’t burn precious calories that waste food resources and increase one’s carbon footprint. Regardless, I personally vow zero participation. If I walk or carpool anywhere, it will be despite the Earth Dayers.

The Earth Day page informs interested cyberpatrons that they can get more information from yet another free website. There is no snooty Wall Street Journal-type subscription necessary:

The Greater Buffalo-Niagara Regional Transportation Council has created a new way for travelers and other ride-seekers to find transportation alternatives. This secure, easy-to-use and FREE website provides information on smarter travel options – including carpooling, taking the bus/rail, and bicycling.

It’s remarkable that Earth Day’s goals just happen to coincide with increased support of public transportation. “Public” is the operative word, especially given the list of sponsors provided on the page. As a hint, you better have liked the bus ad, as you were unwittingly kind enough to subsidize its creation.

For one, Erie County figures you’d just spend your earnings on things you want or need; nothing you buy is as important as saving the planet from humans. That’s apparently why the area is listed as a sponsor.

Unsurprisingly, the aforementioned Greater Buffalo Niagara Regional Transportation Council gave money, too. It’s not the only time they’ve spent what’s yours, as their site includes a list of stimulus projects in which they’ve participated. Sponsoring Earth Day awareness ads totally creates jobs, and undoubtedly saves them, too. The NFTA is also onboard, as they’d like us to reduce air pollution and have exact fare ready.

Further, the Celebration is being subsidized by something called Business Gets Green. Their site, which I have mysteriously forgotten to hyperlink to, states that it’s an initiative sponsored by State Senator Antoine Thompson. His shady participation shows that the sole eco-employment beneficiaries are politicians who shamelessly attach their names to boondoggles that only exist thanks to government subsidies.

On top of that, a group called UB Green kicked in cash. Their page similarly features the usual part of the solution, act blah locally blah whatever commands. My sources indicate that this “UB” is a publicly-supported higher learning institution, meaning that they picked up the tab only after rifling through our pockets first.

At least the antediluvian forces could admit their errors. Being wrong is a common human occurrence, although liberal humans sure seem to more frequently partake in this experience. By contrast, refusing to admit being wrong is the height of foolishness. Actually, the same types are also particularly adept at this conduct. We should thank them for providing good behavioral yardsticks which we can strive to outshine.

But they wouldn’t say “You’re welcome,” as they’ll continue to blunder forward. At worst, they’ll continue to phase out the term “global warming” and shift to the weaselly phrase “climate change,” just like how they’ve dumped the politically toxic “gun control” in favor of “gun safety.”

On the other side, skeptics don’t need vague euphemisms about the environment: industries increase efficiency as a byproduct of competition, effluence is the cost of having a dynamic, comfortable, climate-controlled civilization, purchasing more efficient products is in customers’ interest, and a century or so of progress hasn’t overheated the Earth or even turned up the global thermostat a degree.

Go ahead and celebrate Earth Day if you’d like. But pay for your own party. And note that most respectable retailers won’t accept a hug, lousy poem, or parking lot-created tie-dye shirt as compensation for supplies.